The effects of his chemotherapy were visible as he chatted soberly with Cooper about everything from waking up one day "feeling like death," to his prognosis, to prayer (Hitchens is an atheist), his new book (the promotional tour for which was recently cut short) and the controversy over the mosque at Ground Zero.

In the clip below, Hitchens discusses his odds of survival:

COOPER: So, you are hopeful?

HITCHENS: Well I'm not fatalistic, I'm not resigned, but I'm realistic too. The statistics in my case are very poor. Not many people come through esophageal cancer and live to talk about it, or not for long. And the other wager is, the part of the wager, it's a certainty you'll have a terrible time and you may wish you were dying because it's an awful process. That you can't escape, you're going to get that no matter what. Then the torture may or may not be worth it or it will be torture by execution.